Praying Mantis, Bunny and Chipmunk appearing in my yard

Being from a neighborhood that boasted entrance to the woods within walking distance, I was used to seeing wildlife in my yard.  We always had bunnies, chipmunks and squirrels with the occasional possum that would show up under our garbage can stand.  When I moved to my present home, I was disappointed that I never got to see these creatures within the limits of my yard.

This year has shown me an abundance of wildlife again.  We had one chipmunk, there could be more, that came back and forth in the alley from a neighbors yard to climb my bird feeder pole and raid the goodies that I put out for the birds.

But this year for the first time, I was privileged to see a newborn bunny that would go back and forth between yards eating the clover.  It is now half grown and still gives me pause to wonder at the beauty of nature.

We talked about the purple finch that visited the gardens in a friend's yard.  We talked about the goldfinch that flitted across the neighbor's garden and stopped at my bird feeder.

In another event, I was sitting idly thinking about all the weights of the mind that cloud a peaceful day.  I have excellent peripheral vision and movement of bugs and spiders catch my attention for no other reason but that they moved.  That day I was not aware of being watched ever so carefully by the tiniest of preying mantis that I had ever seen.  It had been a few years since I had spied a full grown mantis crawling up the side of my house.

Before the new owners tore it down, my neighbor and I shared a dead space between another neighbor's garage and our property lines.  Behind this garage grew a menagerie of vines that I'm not totally sure what they are.  For years I have bent them back and tried make them grow away from the fence that separates our yards.

I spoke to my neighbor about trying to cut them back together and he said he was trying to find a natural weed killer instead of using one that was on the market.  To make a long story short, I concocted a batch from one I had seen on Pinterest and sprayed the vines.  When I reported what I had done my neighbor told me he had not sprayed the vines because he had spied two preying mantis among the vines.  I felt horrible because I had literally killed their home.

To my relief, this little fellow came to visit me.  All is well with the world again because nature has proven to me that it's creatures do survive.